Buying peaches, apricots, displaying a tray of five fruits, breaking the ground, buying salt, lucky money, asking for letters, going to pagodas… are customs that bring luck and blessings every New Year’s Eve and spring in Vietnam.
Lunar New Year is an important event for Vietnamese people. The traditional customs on this occasion have a deep meaning, with the desire to bring luck and fortune for a happy and prosperous new year.
Descendants often visit ancestral graves from about 23 to 30 December, repair and clean to show filial piety and invite ancestral spirits to their descendants.
In the last days of the year, Vietnamese people have the custom of cleaning the house, buying new utensils and clothes. Adults also instruct their children and grandchildren that in the moment of transition, they will not argue, punish or make mistakes. Those who have animosity with each other also erase it all, the New Year moment only congratulates each other on what is good and lucky.
Families in the North often cannot lack peach branches in their homes every spring and Tet holiday. The vibrant red-pink color of peach blossoms both creates a joyful spring atmosphere, and also has the meaning of warding off evil spirits and bringing good luck in the new year. The most common type of peach is the spangled peach with large, multi-petaled, dark colored flowers.
Peach blossoms are bright red-pink. (Photo: Vu Minh Quan/Zing).
At the same time, the kumquat tree is also an indispensable feature of Tet. A beautiful tree is usually luxuriant, has a beautiful canopy, with yellow fruit, young fruit, green leaves, full blooms, symbolizing abundance, fortune, good food.
In the South, due to the characteristics of the climate, people often play apricot instead of peaches and kumquats. The bright yellow color of apricot flowers is a symbol of glory, success, and fertility. People often choose trees with many buds and buds before Tet, due to the belief that flowers blooming on New Year’s Eve or early on the first day will bring much luck, prosperity and happiness to the family in that year. Common apricot flowers have 5 petals, but there are flowers 6-7, even 10 petals. The more flowers and petals the tree has, the more luck the owner will have in the new year.
The five-fruit tray is an indispensable custom of Vietnamese people on the occasion of the New Year. “Five” is the number 5, the symbolic number of life such as five elements, five flavors, five colors, five organs… Fruits represent abundance, abundance, flowering and fruiting. Each region, each region has a different way of displaying five fruits, but they all choose fruits with special meaning.
Southerners often display the main fruits as custard apple, coconut, papaya, mango, read as “just enough demand” with the desire to have a prosperous new year, adding figs to symbolize the fullness of life. health, money. In addition, the tray also has beautiful fruits such as watermelons, apples, peaches…
The five-fruit tray of the North is indispensable for a bunch of green bananas, symbolizing spring, carpentry, and meaning like a protective hand, enveloping, catching luck. The Buddha’s hand or the pomelo is the earth element, wishing for blessings to fill the house. Red fruits such as oranges, tangerines, and persimmons represent the fire element, white fruits such as whips, peaches as needles, and black fruits such as plums, sapodillas, and grapes represent water elements. The five-fruit tray is full, full, full of five elements for all advantages, happiness, luck.
Banh chung, banh tet are an indispensable part of the cultural beauty of the Vietnamese people. Every year on Tet holiday around the 27th, 28th and 29th of Tet, every family gathers together to pack banh chung and banh chung. tet.
The package of banh chung and banh tet is an indispensable part of the cultural beauty of the Vietnamese people.
In the South, there are banh tet, cylindrical cakes, in the North, there are square banh chung, although the shape is different, the ingredients are exactly the same, rice is the main ingredient of the cake, the cake represents the symbol of the cake. the long-standing wet rice culture of the Vietnamese people.
This tradition dates back to the time of the Hung Kings and until now is an irrevocable thing in the cultural beauty of Tet holidays, every family has to pack a few dozen cakes to worship ancestors, give gifts to friends. relatives often eat at Tet. When wrapping banh chung, it is time to remember their roots, people have more time to gather together, tell stories about an old year that has passed and hope for a new year filled with squares, banh tet cakes. The more round and square the banh chung, the more complete, prosperous and successful the new year will be.
Legend has it that every year on the New Year, the devil comes to destroy the crowd, so to ward off evil spirits and bad luck, in each place, a tree is erected to signal that this place has an owner, the devil does not. to be harassed.
The tree is a bamboo tree about 5 to 6 meters high, at the top of the tree often hangs many things with gold and silver paper, exorcism charms, wine gourds braided with straw, next to it hangs a small lantern. The meaning of warding off evil spirits, bad luck, and the meaning of lighting a lamp for ancestors to know the way home to celebrate Tet with their children and grandchildren. The tree that was erected from December 23 to the end of January 7 will be taken down.
This is the time of transition between the old year and the new year, a sacred moment of harmony between heaven and earth. New Year’s Eve is held at the last moment of the old year, so the activity also means to bring away all the bad things of the old year and welcome the good things of the new year. New Year’s Eve offerings must be performed outdoors.
Vietnamese people have the concept that the first person to come home after New Year’s Eve or the morning of the first day of Tet will decide everything for the whole year. The person invited by the owner to break the ground is usually a person of age, healthy, successful, good-natured, with the wish that they bring luck to the whole family. The land breakers will visit the house and wish the owner good things. The person who broke the ground was also blessed for doing a good deed.
On the first day of the year, Vietnamese people often choose a beautiful time, a beautiful direction to depart, hoping for a lucky new year every time they step out of the house.
The morning of the first day of Tet is usually the time when children and grandchildren gather to wish their grandparents and parents a long life, express filial piety and respect for the elders in the family. Children will receive red envelopes containing new coins called “opening money” to grow up quickly, have more joy and luck in the new year. Happy birthday money is not important in the amount of money or not, but important in the meaning.
He explained the meaning of the written word. (Photo: Write Quan).
This is a cultural beauty of the Vietnamese people, symbolizing the tradition of studiousness and respect for words. People often go to the homes of the elderly, temples or Temples of Literature to ask for words with good meanings such as Phuc, Loc, Duc… to pray for a lucky new year. Flexible, flowery handwriting on red or yellow paper background has both spiritual meaning and brings a solemn atmosphere for spring day.
“Buy salt at the beginning of the year, buy lime at the end of the year” is a phrase that every Vietnamese knows. According to the ancient concept, salty salt can exorcise evil spirits, bring good luck and symbolize strong affection, glue paint. Therefore, at the beginning of the year, there are often hawkers selling salt everywhere so that families can buy a bowl of salt full of tops, with the wish that the new year will be peaceful and prosperous, and everyone in the house will be harmonious and attached.
This custom is an indispensable spiritual activity in the early spring with Vietnamese people. Usually, after the year-end meal, the women in the family often prepare the ceremony and go to the temple near the house to pray. Instead of picking buds, now people often buy sugar cane, begonia flowers or branches to bring good luck home to their families. At the beginning of the year, people often make spring trips to many famous pilgrimage sites to pray for their family’s health and prosperity.
Picking buds at the beginning of spring is a traditional beauty in the Vietnamese New Year. Loc picking is usually done on New Year’s Eve or early morning of the first day of the New Year to pray for luck and bring fortune into the house.